March 8 Devotion

UP A TREE
Please read Luke 19: 1—10

Surely you know the story of Zacchaeus meeting Jesus! As a child you may have learned a song in church school kindergarten about this event. It describes Jesus’ spiritual insight and Zacchaeus’ conversion. Luke immortalized the happy occasion in the first 10 verses of Chapter 19 of his gospel.

It might have happened differently! Let’s examine one possible scenario—

Zacchaeus had heard the exciting rumors of a young rabbi drawing large crowds—even performing miracles! As this man, Jesus, would be passing nearby, Zacchaeus hoped to get a glimpse of Him. Because he was short, Zacchaeus found a sycamore tree and climbed up to a lower limb. He was safely ensconced when the entourage came in to view. As they drew near him, the imposing figure at the center of the group stopped, looked up in the tree, and spoke.

“Zacchaeus!”
“Who, me?”
“Yes, you.”
“You know my name?”
“I know everyone’s name.”
“Uh, oh!”
“Zacchaeus, come down. I’d like to speak to you.”
“But I only came to watch.”
“I know, but we could have dinner at your house this evening.”
“I work for the Romans!”
“I know.”
“I’m a tax collector!”
“I know.”
“I make my living from commissions.”
“I know.”
“I haven’t been honest!”
“I know.”
“**Sigh** I have enemies—I could be in danger if I come down.”
“Zacchaeus, you’ll be fine.”
“But I just don’t want to get involved…”

And so the discourse continued—finally Jesus turned to James and John, “Go get him down and bring him to me…just don’t hurt him.” Zacchaeus saw them coming and tried to dodge away. James was able to grab one foot and pull—John got the other. Zacchaeus wrapped his arms around that sycamore and dug his fingernails into the bark. Bark flew! Fingernails broke! Forearms were scraped! But it was no use.

At last, James and John escorted a disheveled and contrite Zacchaeus up to Jesus. The little man timidly looked up into Jesus’ face. Voila! He immediately morphed into the Zacchaeus Luke would later write about. Why? No one! No one can come face to face with Jesus and remain unchanged!

Could there be a bit of this Zacchaeus in each of us?! Do we sometimes prefer being ‘up a tree’ – ‘out on a limb’ rather than coming down to mingle with the crowd and walk with Jesus? Perhaps we need to check our fingernails for signs of sycamore bark.

Floyd Taylor